Not A Hero
by AlexLone
Summary: The leaving of a letter, the descent into self-loathing. The confused mind and ranting of the man leaving everything to run. Barry leaves everything behind with a letter saying goodbye. Saying goodbye isn't easy, especially to your loved ones.


Not A Hero

I do not of Flash or any characters in this story.

I watch on the security monitor as Cisco's breach opens and you all emerge. A tear slips down my cheek as I trace your faces on the monitor: the strong Iris, Caitlin so determined, the wry smile of Cisco and Wally's casual nonchalance. I remember how it once was, how I wish it could be again, how happy we should have been. I see the breach close and know you will be here shortly, not realising I'm watching you all one last time. One last time, the tears well and fall, as I read the letter once last time.

 _My friends,_

 _If you are reading this, it means I've passed into the Speed Force, I've finally managed to do what I have wanted to for the last year. I'm able to run free again. I don't know how you'll feel at this, if indeed you care, or maybe you'll be happy. Happy that I'm gone, out of your lives and freeing you to be who you want. I think that's what it will be. I doubt anyone will be sad, I've seen the looks you give me, felt the behaviours you direct at me and suffered the pain you inflict._

 _I wish I could hate you all, but I can't, I can't help but love you, my friends. If I could hate you maybe I could be stronger, maybe I could be better, but I can't and I'm still weak, still me, still inferior._

 _Maybe if I was better, smarter, stronger, faster, you wouldn't treat me like you have. Though I now realise dealing with me is like having to hold the hand of a toddler learning to walk. I mean, who was I kidding, I was never a hero, even when you all tried to prop me up, it was never me._

 _How many other metahumans have taken as long as me to learn their powers? How many fell into a nine month coma before they could access their powers? How many came around with near complete mastery of their power while I'm always playing catchup?_

 _Guess I belong in the remedial metahuman class then._

 _Look at you, Cisco, Caitlin and Wally, all of you learned how to access your abilities and grow in them faster than me, none of you had to be taken care of for nine months in a coma, so why did I?_

 _It's because I was an accident, I was never meant to be the Flash, I was never meant for any of this, and you have all shown me this. God, even now, I can't stop the tears as I realise I was never the hero I thought I was. It was always someone in my ear telling me what to do, telling me how to act, it was always someone else solving the problem. I was just a giant metahuman puppet for you all._

 _Everytime I tried to do things myself I screwed up, taking on Zoom, losing my speed, the Flashpoint, the obsession with Savitar, the Thinker._

 _Since I became the Flash, that's what people wanted, my work at CCPD came second, my mind ignored. I'm no idiot, I may not be a genius like Harry, Jessie, Caitlin and Cisco, but I'm not an idiot, at least I thought I wasn't but after a while the evidence mounts up._

 _How many did I fail to save? How many died for my mistakes? How many suffered because I wasn't better?_

 _Now when we train, you mock me, you limit me so that I lose each time, restricting my abilities when we train so that I can't access them completely, all under the guise of making me better, making me stronger but I think it is just a chance for you to get your revenge, to show me who is better, who is stronger._

 _Coordinated by Iris, you all attack me, my abilities dampened forcing me to defend myself as if I had an arm tied behind me, Wally mocking me for being slow, Cisco blasting me into Caitlin's ice wall, their laughter as I try to rise. You tell me I need to learn to cope while I'm impaired._

 _You tell me this, when my leg is broken by Cisco, or my shoulder dislocated by Wally and when Caitlin pierces my torso with an icicle. I'm told I need to get stronger, so I need to practice while impaired to learn to compensate but each time I look as though I'm improving you take more of me away._

 _I never asked for this, you all imposed it on me, you refused to listen unless to mock me for being weak. And I guess I am, sitting here waiting till just before you return to write this, returning from a trip to Earth 2 to help Jessie, a trip you left me behind on. The last thing before writing this letter was to check in on Felicity, just to check she was okay before I go, I watched her work for a while, hidden away so as not to disturb her just as you want me to be._

 _I wish hate was easier, but I still love you all. Though I need to be free, I can't be here any more, I can't live this existence. I can't live this half life, I want to be whole again and I can't be that here._

 _Why has every other speedster been better than me? Zoom, Reverse-Flash, Savitar, even Trajectory who used drugs to get speed showed more promise._

 _I'm rambling now or is that continuing to ramble, but I've always rambled and my mind is so full of things, of regrets and broken promises, of anger and love, of nothing and everything._

 _Before I go, I just want to say somethings, some thoughts for each of you._

 _Joe, my dad, the one who took a scared little boy into his home without thought and raised him like his own. I have nothing but gratitude left for you. If it wasn't for you, I would never have made it this far, I would never have grown up, I would still be lost in the moment of my mother's death. Take care Joe, take care of Cecile and your kid, you are a father, a dad to many and I'm grateful for the life you gave me._

 _Cisco, I wish I could say my brother, my friend but I know since Flashpoint you harbour resentment towards me, that you blame me for Dante, that I wouldn't change time again. You overcame your fear of your abilities but you have also become less Cisco and more Reverb, the injuries and mocking you inflict on me in training and the way you deal with criminal metahumans betrays the new viciousness in you. I hope that you find that light in you again, that eventually you realise that the past is the past, our decisions are our own and the future is still to be written._

 _Wally, the speedster, the one always at my heels, the jealous brother and son. I can say it now I'm going, you've always resented me, you think I took your place in Joe's family, that you had to be better than me, that you had to beat me at each turn. I think you resent me for marrying your sister. You play the game well, you hide it well but I see it. I see that you think me weak, that I'm not good enough. I agree with you, I'm not good enough, I am weak. I needed everyone more than they needed me and now they have you. Just cherish them and look after them._

 _Iris, my wife, my love, you don't know how it has pained me these last months to see you look at me how you have. You look at me as though you are ashamed of me, you look with pity as I am beaten by the others, as I lie on the floor bleeding. You rarely touch me anymore, you see the weakness in me and you loath it. But I can't stop loving you, but do you love me, have you ever loved me, me as in Barry? You didn't change your mind till well after you learned of my abilities and then learning of the paper, so was it choice or did you just want the Flash? If I never had the speed would you ever have looked at me as a husband? You now control everything, you once said we are the Flash, but slowly it become you and the others and I was just the training dummy, the punching bag, I am no longer the Flash, the Flash is gone. I don't know who I am anymore, who am I when I don't love you anymore? I've loved you almost my whole life and I don't know how to be me without that? Who am I, Iris, who am I? Now that you look at me with pity and shame. It wouldn't have been long before you left me, I'm a broken man, not worth your time, but you have always been strong, you will move on. How do I do that? Without us, do I exist?_

 _Caitlin, my doctor, another victim of mine or so everyone would have me believe. How much you must hate me? You blame me for the abilities which you now flaunt with ease yet at the same time revel in the power they bring you. I was thrust into your life and ever since I turned it upside down and inside out. Yes, I made bad decisions, I made mistakes but never maliciously, can you say the same? Now be honest. I understand being hurt, of wanting to blame me and you can continue to do so. But we make our own choices once our cards are dealt, and you were the best of us, you were the moral one, to go with your intelligence. Where was that intelligence when your abilities started to appear? You hid them, you assumed you would go bad and that everything would happen like on Earth 2, and I take some blame here, I was so focussed on Iris that I missed it happening under my nose but there was an element of self-fulfilment here. Our powers, our abilities don't define us, no power changes our mind like Killer Frost appeared to change you, was it really a change or did you let the power consume you? Did you feel that you could let go and let your darkness come through, that you could break out of the helpful smart doctor role and be a force to be reckoned with? Cisco was faced with the concept of Reverb and he has mostly avoided it, so why would you be different? Unless you felt you deserved to let go, that all your pain deserved an outlet? That life was unfair taking your father, taking Ronnie twice, that Jay was Zoom and Julian released you. That all this meant it was okay to let go and let the power control you, that your darkness had a free pass to come out as we had all known about Killer Frost on Earth 2? Surely you are too smart for that?_

 _Did any of you ever consider that I fought to keep the darkness away in me, that I had lost and lost, that I lost my mother, then Zoom took my father, that all the people I failed to save haunt me each night, that Savitar haunts my dreams, that in order to restore you all from Flashpoint to save everyone, I had to beg my nemesis to kill my mother again? That I've held my dying mother on many occasions, that I saw my father die in front of me, that I saw myself die, that I sacrificed my time remnants to save the world, that people have died because I wasn't fast enough and I had to watch it happen? That I was broken by many of our enemies and never quite recovered, that my family, my friends, my team took to training me by essentially torture because they blamed me. That I struggle with what is right and what is quick? Be careful about embracing your darkness, because think about what could have happened if I had embraced mine. I could easily have become this world's Zoom and it would have been hellish, Zoom ruled through fear, fear enforced by his power, and I could have had that power. Think about that, that I, weak and pathetic as I am, held back my darkness to help and all of you appear to be reaching for yours because you think it makes you strong._

 _I hope that now the future will change, that you now hold the future in your hands and you look after it, all of you._

 _I guess I'm lonely now, you all work together and I rarely get to join you. The city thinks I'm gone, replaced by you all but soon they will forget me. My job is lonely, a servant to others whims, at the beck and call of others just as I am yours._

 _I'm going now, I'm going to be part of the Speed Force, I've gone in for short periods and it welcomes me. I'm not lonely there, I can be free, I can run and run. The Speed Force wants me, it is nice to be wanted again._

 _I'm not a hero, I'm just a little boy who ran from his demons, I've been running since my mother died. When I became the Flash, I just changed the direction, I started to run at the demons to chase them away. Now you won't let me run, so I need to go where I can. I'm going where my demons cannot catch me, where the demons cannot go. Where I can run and run and never stop. I can be that little boy but this time, I'll run without fear._

 _Goodbye, Iris._

 _Goodbye, Caitlin._

 _Goodbye, Cisco._

 _Goodbye, Wally._

 _Goodbye, Joe._

 _Just a little boy who runs,_

 _Barry._

I fold the letter carefully into its envelope, ensuring that it fits and there are no creases, Caitlin will appreciate that. I write the address on the front, my penmanship steady though my eyes continue to well with tears, Iris always liked to see a handwritten element, the personal touch.

I stand up from the chair, arranging the envelope, the pen next to it.

I must go now, I hear them coming. I release myself, I let myself fall into the Speed Force. I feel the power, the lure of speed, I can run, run free. No constraints, no boundaries or problems, just speed.

As I fade into the Speed Force, I leave behind everything, my guilt, my doubt, my hate, my love. I watch as my wedding ring falls from my finger.

Then I'm running, heading to the horizon I'll never reach, just running and running forever.

.

Wally entered the Cortex first, just in time to see a glint as a ring fell on top the desk. It fell, landing on a pale yellow envelope, a pen beside it. He stopped, wary of what was happening.

The others came into the room, caution in their step as Wally slowed moved around the desk watching the ring. Caitlin started to ask what was wrong, when Wally pointed to the desk.

They looked, seeing the single atop an envelope addressed, "To the Team".

The address was in a familiar handwriting, then they recognised the ring.

The world halted, just for a moment, as they tried to grasp what was happening.

Wally opened the envelope carefully, drawing out the letter inside.

Together, they read the letter.

Silence reigned.


End file.
